The minister in the prime minister’s department said the statement from the DAP secretary-general simply shows that it was the water restructuring deal that had reduced the debt rather than any action by the state under its Competency, Accountability and Transparency (CAT) policy.
“It is typical of Lim Guan Eng to launch a personal attack and calling people names in his official statement but he is unable to deny the undeniable – that Penang’s 95% debt-reduction was due to the federal government’s help and not due to CAT or reduction of corruption.
“I thank Guan Eng for finally acknowledging this in his statement two days ago and setting the record straight. Penangites have been given the impression that the debt reduction was due to his ‘impressive’ leadership as chief minister,” Rahman said.
On Thursday, Lim said the water debts in the restructuring deal were incurred by the previous Barisan Nasional state government. Hence, it is only fair to return those water debts to the BN federal government.
“The water restructuring deal involved a surrender of state rights by the state governments under BN based on an amendment to the Federal Constitution made in 2005, when the state was still under the BN.
“The debts taken over by the federal government was not for free, but in exchange for water assets surrendered by Perbadanan Bekalan Air Pulau Pinang (PBAPP), and now owned by the federal government,” Lim said, saying that these details were left out by Rahman when he first claimed the federal government had aided Penang’s debt reduction.
Rahman, who is also BN strategic communications director, said Lim should admit CAT has not been successful in its objectives.
“He should admit his CAT policy was unsuccessful in reducing the yearly operating expenses of the state government. Instead of efficiency, Penangites saw the yearly state government’s operating expenses increased by a whopping 500% since DAP took over Penang in 2008.
“DAP should also admit that to pay for the uncontrollable increase in spending, the Penang government had to sell or trade away tens of billions of ringgit worth of state land and assets,” Rahman said.
He added that the selling or trading away of state assets to pay for government expenses is not sustainable and is a sign of bad governance.
The debt reduction claim by the state was based on the 2016 Auditor-General’s Report, released in the Dewan Rakyat on July 31, which showed Penang having zero arrears in its debt to the federal government.